When the Well is Poisoned, we will Know the Worth of Water

 

by Markus A. Wagner

 

I remember the long hazy hot summer days of my youth in Niagara. We would often bicycle to the lake, sweating past miles of orchards with trees hanging heavy with cherries, peaches, and plums. And it was worth the effort, for the beach was golden and the water sparkling clean, and we swam and dived for hours from an old concrete pier that is now only a distant memory.

 

Or we would just lie on the beach, soaking up the sun and listening to the rhythm of the lake. There was something so soothing about the lapping of the waves against the sandy shoreline, the regular swish of the water coming in and the woosh of it flowing out, like a slow primeval heartbeat.

 

Kids don’t spend time at the lake anymore. And it’s not because the bicycle ride is now almost completely urbanized, a long stretch of simmering, car-clogged pavement, lined with rows of uninspiring suburban homes. The main reason is the pollution of the water -- beach closures have become all too common. And they are but a small part of a very serious and complex problem.

 

Niagara is surrounded by water. We are blessed by two of the Great Lakes, the mighty Niagara River, a string of smaller rivers and streams, and plentiful groundwater. It seems inconceivable that we could ever run short. But sadly - and the recent nightmare at Walkerton is a darn good wake-up call -- we must ask whether our fresh water supply is in serious jeopardy.

 

It’s frightening. Water, one of the most precious commodities we have on earth, is the lifeblood of our bodies, our crops, our forests, our very existence. The ancient Greeks considered water to be one of the four basic elements that make up the earth. Yet it is taken for granted, like the air we breathe, and is largely ignored, even as it is being threatened.

 

Pollution Primer

 

How serious is the problem and what can be done? Let’s start with the basics. Water, although quite simple in structure (two atoms of hydrogen linked with one atom of oxygen), has the amazing ability to dissolve almost every substance that it comes in contact with. And what it can’t take into solution it can carry in suspension. This property has been put to many beneficial uses by humans, but it also has a sinister side for water can pick up almost everything that modern society and industry produce, including PCBs, dioxins and furans, benzenes, heavy metals such as mercury and cadmium, trichloroethylene, pesticides, oil and grease, and a multitude of microorganisms including E. coli. Great care must be taken to keep contaminants away from water.

 

Scientists divide the sources of water contamination into two categories. Point sources are those that come from distinct identifiable places, for example, factories. Indeed, industrial processes create wastes some of which may be emitted from the ends of pipes into convenient watercourses. There are many examples including paper mills, whose foamy effluent can often be seen - and smelled - bubbling down the Old Welland Canal into Twelve Mile Creek and then into Lake Ontario. And spills can occur. One of Canada’s most infamous spills is at Smithville, Ontario, where PCB-laden oils and fluids have penetrated the clay soil and contaminated the underlying bedrock and groundwater. To date, $50 million has been spent to develop cutting-edge remediation methods; the cleanup, with its associated price tag, is still to come. Landfills, the final resting places of our household and industrial garbage, form a toxic leachate that eventually flows into the groundwater and then finds its way to the nearest lake. There are over 80 landfills in Niagara, most of which are no longer in operation. Sewage treatment plants are serious water polluters, and are primary contributors to beach closures, particularly after rain storms when the plants often by-pass incoming sewage for lack of adequate capacity.

 

Because point sources are identifiable, they are relatively easy to study, monitor and regulate. Thus, considerable effort has been made to control these and minimize their impacts.

 

Non-point source contamination, as the name suggests, comes from a broad area, for example, pesticides and manure are washed into streams from farms as well as urban lawns. Rain runoff from the vast concrete jungle contributes considerable oil and grease from leaking motor vehicles. Significant pollution is carried in the air and deposited by rain. Acid rain, nitrous oxides, dioxins, and other contaminants come from the Ohio Valley, Michigan, and elsewhere. Because of their diffuse nature, non-point sources are more difficult to study and control.

 

Drinking Water

 

All these point and non-point sources affect our water supplies. The question on everybody’s lips is can a tragedy like Walkerton happen here? "No," says Dr. Robin Williams, Medical Officer of Health for the Region of Niagara, emphatically. "The situation here is very different," she explains. "The public drinking-water supply comes almost entirely from surface water that all goes through a rigorous treatment process. The water is tested before and after treatment as well as in the distribution system, and our Department sees all of the test results. In the areas where private wells are used, a thick clay layer protects the underlying aquifer from surface contamination."

 

The water treatment has a long track record of safety. According to Mr. Sal Innello, Niagara Region’s manager of water and wastewater operations, "We have not had a significant boil-water order issued in the history of the Region."

 

Dr. Williams urges that private well users chlorinate their water. She also warns against drinking untreated spring or artesian well water. Although most people think of springs as fresh and pure, they are actually more susceptible to contamination from manure and pesticides than well water.

 

The Long-Term Picture

 

We are fortunate to have a sound water treatment system in Niagara. Considerable effort has also been put into improving the general water quality. Lake Erie has recovered from serious algae overgrowth in the 1970s, many of the notorious leaking industrial landfills along the American side of the Niagara River have been capped, and improvements in sewage treatment plants have decreased the number of beach closures.

 

But these remedial actions, commendable as they are, camouflage a bleak long-term outlook. For example, consider the latest trend in meat production: animal factories. The crowded, dark, cruel conditions are perfect incubators for diseases, including new deadly bacterial and viral strains for which cures are presently not available. These diseases can be spread through manure, of which huge amounts are generated, into surface and groundwater. This mechanism may have played a role in poisoning the wells in Walkerton. Our knowledge of the environmental and health impacts of megafarms is poor, and the regulations for controlling them are still in development.

 

And chlorination of drinking water is far from a panacea. In fact, chlorine is a serious chemical contaminant itself. For example, it can combine with organic material like leaves to form trihalomethane, believed to cause bladder cancer and birth defects.

 

One of Canada’s foremost water ecologists, David Schindler, warns that there is a steady decline in freshwater quality that will reach crisis levels in the next few decades. He paints a stark picture of acid rain, rising global temperatures, human and livestock wastes, increased ultraviolet radiation, airborne toxins, and biological invaders degrading freshwater fisheries and drinking-water supplies beyond the point of repair. For example, in nature wetlands perform a valuable cleansing of tainted water. But thousands of acres of wetlands are lost every year to development, and those that remain are quietly being destroyed by the rising evaporation rates caused by global warming.

 

Solutions?

 

Schindler and many others are quick to point the finger at government, especially the Ontario government with its massive cutbacks to the Ministry of Environment. There is no question that government has a major role to play in protecting our environment, not just by developing and enforcing regulations, but also by supporting basic research so that we can better understand these complex problems and perhaps resolve them before, not after, they cause damage.

 

But we need to look deeper. The fundamental causes of our environmental ills are threefold:

 

- a population that has exceeded what the globe can sustain,

- a voracious, insatiable consumer appetite,

- the technological ability to create and manufacture an enormous range of new synthetic chemicals, many of whose damaging effects on the sensitive web of nature aren’t realized until decades later.

 

How can wetlands and forests not fall under the bulldozer’s blade if our population keeps growing each year? Innovative farming methods like hog and chicken factories are a necessity if we wish to put food in the increasing number of mouths. And if we crave two or three cars, several TV’s, the latest computer with scanner and colour printer, how can we criticize the factories and new chemicals required to make them bigger and better?

 

Ian Brindle of Brock University, is at the forefront of pollution research; he has also been in the trenches identifying and cleaning up pollution in the Niagara River, the Smithville PCB spill, and the Welland River. He feels that solutions should come through prevention rather than at pipe’s end and is a strong advocate of programs such as Green Chemistry, which started in the USA about a decade ago. A voluntary program, it is supported and promoted by the Office of Toxic Substances in the Environmental Protection Agency. Green Chemistry seeks to reduce the impact of chemicals on the environment by carefully assessing their impact prior to use, and by reducing toxicity through the use of alternate chemicals and processes. All newly made chemicals must be submitted to and approved by the EPA prior to mass production. Brindle feels that government intervention and leadership is necessary to protect the environment, and deplores the recent cuts to the Ministry of the Environment.

 

Green Chemistry is a positive change in mindset, but there is so much more that needs to be done. Here are some other areas that need addressing. The dollar rules our market-dominated society. Yet traditional financial analyses omit the cost of the environment. For example, landfills are not charged a penny for their air and leachate emissions. Nor are cars, nor factories, nor power plants. The economic system must be amended so that an appropriate cost is charged for degrading the environment. Surely, clean drinking water, unpolluted air, and beaches that are swimmable enrich our lives and have an enormous value.

 

The single over-riding factor, however, is population growth. This is a difficult social issue, but somehow we must come to grips with it. Then there is our profligate lifestyle. We must tone down our torrid love affair with consumer goods - every SUV we buy pushes us closer to the environmental brink. And other lifestyle changes are needed. Traffic-jammed, fume-filled highways should be replaced by public transportation. Endless sprawling suburbs should be replaced with more compact housing. The road is so long.

 

Benjamin Franklin once said, "When the well’s dry, we know the worth of water." Today he would say, "When we have poisoned our well, we will know its worth."